I sometimes think all authors should follow George R. R. Martin’s example and name each chapter after the character featured in that chapter. It would make it much easier to skim through a book looking for your favorite bits. (Of course, I spoiled A Storm of Swords for myself by skipping ahead reading all of the “Jaime” chapters.)
I never could understand how Ivanhoe could pick that drippy Roweena over the way more interesting Rebecca.
I have always felt that way.
My I put forth Rupert in the Prisoner of Zenda. I understand the author of the book actually wrote an edition about him after the positive response. Ramon Navarro had the part in the first silent and Douglas had the part in the first talkie.
Personally, I think Scott simply chickened out - he just could not buck the prejudices of his day and have the Christian hero marry the Jewish heroine.
Good lord, does Robert Jordan fit this one!
The purported protagonist of the Wheel of Time saga is Rand al Thor, the Dragon Reborn. In reality, there are a near-infinite number of secondary, tertiary and quaternary characters who show up and disappear within chapters who are about fifty times more interesting than him. There is, for instance, an associate of Perrin’s, a fellow wolf-brother, whose name escapes me but whose character is very vivid in my mind. The Tinkers, as a whole, are a tribe that I’d love to hear more about (though I know the history already, I’d like to hear the details of their travails since they broke from the original Aiel). Quite a few of the more obscure Aes Sedai leave me wanting to read more about them.
I keep finding myself wishing Jordan would just FOCUS on someone for a chapter or two instead of running around the continent trying to get all of his primary characters “screen time” every book. I’ve said it before and I’ll keep saying it: Jordan needs an editor he’s not married to.
Douglas Fairbanks Jr.
Note to self, don’t get in a hurry.
The protagonist of Dracula is Jonathan Harker, but Professor Abraham Van Helsing is much more formidable and interesting. Several works of fiction have centered around Van Helsing and/or his descendants. Harker, not so much.
Jordan needs to finish the thing before he dies.
I think the Princess Bride has several characters who are more intersting than the title character. Buttercup is a bit of a self centered whiner who is content to be a Trophy Bride. Wesley is a little more interesting, but he’s also a little over-the-top and hard to believe, even an a “Fairy Tale” setting.
Inigo Montoya has a very compelling backstory and complex relationships with his father, his father’s friend (the famous swordmaker whose name I cannot remember), Fezzik, Vizzini, Wesley and, of course, the Six-Fingered man. He has to overcome alcoholism and learn how to deal with his inablilty to avenge his father’s death. He is one of my favorite characters from any book.
I also like the story of the narrator/ author from the framing story. In the movie it doesn’t amount to much more than Fred Savage sitting in bed, but in the book there is a lot of development around his adult home life and his relationship with his wife and son. The Grandfather reading to his grandson is still there, but you also get an insight into the lessons he learned about life not being fair and that kissing isn’t all bad.
Good one, SiXSwordS! Inigo Montoya is responsible for one of my favorite passages in prose literature anywhere:
I think it’s the lack of question mark on “so why waste sympathy on the man in black” that gets me.
What about a TV series? Everyone in the supporting cast of “Caroline in the City” was far, far more interesting than Caroline. She was the straight man to all the great characters.
I’m a HUGE fan of John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee, and if I lost something of value I’d definitely sign on to split its value with him when he recovered it, BUT the guy I want to hang around with is his friend Meyer
Amen to that!
I was always more interested in the Fool than Fitz (in the books by Robin Hobb - The Farseer Trilogy and The Tawny Man Trilogy).
I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again, and then probably until the end of time: Agent Sands from Once Upon a Time in Mexico. He’s clever, goofy, devious, totally sociopathic, curses at children, and an agent for the CIA. By the end of the movie, he’s also a blind gunfighter. Much more interesting than the bland El Mariachi.
He deserves his own movie. Or maybe even a trilogy. Give the man anything! I want to see him again.
Mary, from the Laura Ingalls Wilder books.
I know they’re semi-autobiographical, but I’d like to know more about what Mary’s thinking. She loses her sight, yet teaches herself to sew and knit and crochet and clean and really do almost everything she could do before. She’s excited and grateful to go to college, but she must know that once she graduates, she’ll spend the rest of her life living in darkness in a nowhere little town with her family. I wonder how that made her feel; Laura paints her as good and patient and angelic; didn’t she ever feel depression or despair? And I wonder what that woman would have been capable of if she hadn’t gone blind; by Laura’s own account Mary was the brighter of the two, and Laura wasn’t dumb by any means.
If TV shows count–what about Buffy, Vampire Slayer? She slew, she sulked, she was (occasionally) happy.
But I always wanted to know more about Rupert Giles. What else did he do when he was “Ripper”? Heck, I’d love to go out drinking with Ethan Rayne–although I wouldn’t leave my drink alone.
Willow was truly charming–& funnier than Buffy. She also went through some interesting changes.
I was disappointed not to learn more of Anya’s story. How does a vengeance demon develop bunny-phobia?
Angel was the “hero”–but who wouldn’t prefer Spike?
Speaking of villains–the Mayor was evil to the bone. But his vision of the Angel/Buffy relationship was dead on. And he was truly devoted to Faith.
My husband and I were just discussing the Slattery situation in GWTW. Frankly, as a Southerner who is familiar with a wide range of Southern Literature, I believe the situation is the most realistic depiction of the south in the entire film. The rest is the “moonlight and magnolias” myth people like my mother (99%) of us cannot release. The real South? Deliverance, The Prince of Tides, anything by Faulkner, etc. Basically, GWTW is the dream of what the South would have liked to have been, an idyllic place, with happy, funny slaves, beautiful women whom the men adored, etc. In reality, the plantation owner probably preferred one of the slaves over the wife, and she also lived in the home. Obviously, the slaves weren’t cracking jokes right and left. It’s a sham, a beautiful sham if you are white, but a sham. Hell, most people lived the life of Wilkerson and Emmie, not the O’Haras. (Not to mention that the Irish immigrants had not moved up quite that far on the social and wealth ladder by that time as a rule.) So, Emmy Slattery is the better character.
I think a strong contender would be Hannibal Lecter in Harris’ red Dragon and (as Hannibal Lecktor, played by Brian Cox) in the film Manhunter. He absolutely stole the show in the movie. When I went to see Silence of the Lambs, without knowing anything about the film, I was delighted when I heard the character’s name, because it was clear to me that Harris had given his character more “screen time”.
HAL in 2001 is unquestionably more interesting than any of the humans, and I think I’ve read that this was actually by design: They deliberately made the human characters “less human” to make HAL seem more so.
Spoiler alert: he doesn’t.